Man Punches Police Dog

A Delray Beach man hit a police dog in the jaw while trying to escape from authorities Saturday night, city police said.

Jerome Friedman, 24, is now behind bars on multiple charges, including injuring a police dog. The dog, Benny, is doing well, according to police.

Officers first began searching for Friedman around 9:40 p.m., after getting a call from the valet company, according to his arrest report. Brian Young, who worked at the valet lot in the parking lot of 55 SE 2nd Ave., said he told Friedman to leave after seeing him riding a bike around the private lot.

Young left the lot and returned to find him sitting behind the wheel of a Cadillac Escalade, “rummaging through” the car.

“I don’t think that’s your car, Bro,” Young said, according to the report.

Friedman took off running, losing both his shoes along the way. Also left behind was his bike, which stood near hedges in the parking lot.

Shortly after, another valet employee saw a suspicious person matching the thief’s description behind the market at Southeast Second Avenue and Second Street. Police headed to the area and spotted Friedman, who ran away despite an officer’s shouts of “Stop, police!”

The dog and an officer began tracking him and found him inside a Dumpster between Southeast Third and Fourth avenues, the report states. An officer pointed a handgun at Friedman and told him to get out of the trash and raise his hands.

He refused to move, so the officer warned him the police dog would be released if he didn’t comply. After being told to get out of the Dumpster two more times, Friedman “hesitatingly” climbed out, then looked side to side and started to reach toward his waistband, according to the report.

The officer released the dog, which headed for Friedman. That’s when he grabbed it by the jaws and tried to pull it off him, the report states.

An officer used a Taser on Friedman, who was then arrested. Officers found a passport, and nothing else, on him. Friedman later told an investigator he got in the Escalade to “look cool” and hit on women.